“We are looking at the legal framework to see how we can ensure that women’s rights are always respected”, launched Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, referring to the possibility of strengthening the protection of the right to abortion among women of Canada.
She instructed the Minister of Health, Jean-Yves Duclos, and the Minister for Women and Gender Equality, Marci Ien, to study the file. fast. The goal: ensure that, not only now, but under any future government, women’s rights are well protected.
We asked the ministers to take a quick look at it, let’s see what their work schedule would behe replied when asked by a reporter if Canadians could expect a result within a year.
The Prime Minister responded to the shocking leak of a document that revealed on Monday that the U.S. Supreme Court would soon overturn Roe v. Wade, who has been protecting abortion rights federally since 1973.
” Our government will never back down in defending women’s rights here at home and around the world. “
How is the right to abortion protected in Canada?
The right to abortion is not protected by Canadian law, but by case law, more specifically by R. c. Morgentaler made by the Supreme Court in 1988.
It all started with Dr. Henry Morgentaler, who is under the law because he performed an abortion at his private clinic in Toronto. At the time, section 251 of the Criminal Code prohibited anyone perform the abortion of a female manin addition to prohibiting women from voluntary termination of pregnancy.
His case went to the Supreme Court, which eventually ended, by a majority of five judges to two, which Section 251 clearly constitutes an attack on a woman’s physical and emotional integrity. Forcing a woman, under threat of criminal punishment, to bring a fetus up to term unless she meets certain specific criteria independent of her own priorities and aspirations is a severe interference with her body and therefore a breach of personal security.
In doing so, abortion is criminalized in Canada, but its practice and access is not stated in federal law.
It is rare, but not impossible, for the Supreme Court of Canada to overturn one of its decisions. For example, in 2015 its judges overturned its 1993 decision of Rodriguez v. British Columbia, where he insisted that the ban on medical assistance in death does not violate certain rights protected by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Canada is trying to limit the right to abortion
Unfortunately, we know from what we see in our neighbors to the south, but also from what we see in debates within the Conservative Party of Canada, that we need to make sure there are protections to not we see this decline as in the United Statestherefore explained by Justin Trudeau on Wednesday morning.
Justin Trudeau also referred to a Bloc motion proposed on Tuesday to recognize women’s free choice and rejected by some MPs.
In the past, conservatives have tried to restrict the right to abortion. A bill introduced by Brian Mulroney’s Progressive Conservative government in 1991 wanted to limit this right to women whose health was at risk because of pregnancy. The Senate rejected this.
With the advent of Stephen Harper’s Conservative Party in 2006, various private member bills were filed that directly or indirectly affected the issue of abortion and fetus. They all failed.
Unequal access to abortion across Canada
Another consequence of the fact that no federal law governs the right to abortion: its access is unequal across the country.
In New Brunswick, for example, the Blaine Higgs government limits access to surgical abortion to three hospitals in the province: the two hospitals in Moncton and the hospital in Bathurst.
Further west, in Saskatchewan, pro-choice activists are attacking the wait times and lack of information about the medical and surgical procedures surrounding abortion.
We fund studies to look at the reality of access, which we know is not the same across the country.said Justin Trudeau on Wednesday morning.
Source: Radio-Canada
